


genesis, creation, beginnings

by sepulchralsymphonies



Series: a man and his muse [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Cuban Lance (Voltron), Gay Keith (Voltron), M/M, Minor Adam/Shiro (Voltron), Playboy Lance, keith has had a very sad life, keith is an innocent church boy, lance is a mercenary sort of thing idk it's very confusing sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-10
Updated: 2020-01-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:14:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22199956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sepulchralsymphonies/pseuds/sepulchralsymphonies
Summary: Leandro pulls away, mouth stained red and skin molten gold. "You're the little church boy, aren't you?" He lifts a hand to cradle his cheek, and smiles crookedly. "Then seek, and ye shall find."
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Series: a man and his muse [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1581634
Comments: 6
Kudos: 55





	genesis, creation, beginnings

**Author's Note:**

> Please don't ask me which era this is set in, I don't know. I wrote it on a whim and it's kind of shitty but I'm forcing myself to work through my creative block. sorry and please enjoy, love youuuuuu.

It's not difficult to feel awake while the town sleeps. Everything is quiet, silent and muted, as if the darkness has reached out and wrapped a firm hand around the throats of all living and breathing things that the dusty little hollow houses. The echoing yell of the baker when he endorses his bread, the clatter of hooves against the dirt-packed earth, the creaking smash of the anvil against the molten iron of the blacksmith's forge— all of it falls mum. The world holds its breath when the night creeps along, and Keith learns to love and laugh and swear by the light of the moon when it pours in through the scratched windowpanes of the attic.

The softest snores drift up through the minute gaps between the planks holding their house together. Their mother sleeps soundly in the lone room downstairs, exhausted after a long day of entertaining guests that fluttered in through their welcoming doors after the preacher's last sermon of the day. Keith’s hands and mouth ache from holding up heavy trays and heavy smiles all through the afternoon, nodding along politely at every fond pat to his cheek and firm clap on his back with a _yes ma'am_ , and _oh thank you ma'am that is most gracious of you_ , and _yes sir my brother is helping me find a job at the factory sir yes sir_ and _would you like some more wine with that ma'am mother told me you have a liking for these_. Their mother had practically preened at every impressed glance around their pristine little house, prim and polished until it reeked of perfection, and Keith had leaned back against the kitchen door and prayed for it all to be over soon.

The street is empty, wiped clean of all signs of life. The blacksmith's forge still glows faintly with the last of the dying embers, there's deep gouges in the dirt from the carts bound for the factory that had rattled down the street before the sky had turned pink and returned to the city before the sun went down, and the faintest scent of melted sugar wafts in through the crack in the screen. It seems familiar, homely, and Keith sits back in his chair heavily. The desk scrapes roughly against the floor, and he shifts his legs to the side.

"You're tired, aren't you," Shiro says quietly, from his perch by the window. It isn't framed like a question.

"Yes," Keith says, wearily. "Very."

Shiro doesn't reply, still continuing to stare, face turned to the sky. A beam of liquid silver drags along the downturned curve of his mouth. Keith wonders if he's staring at the tailor's shop at the end of the street. The Waterstons haven't opened their doors for the last fortnight. There have been misplaced rumours, that their youngest son has disappeared.

"You weren't here today," Keith says softly. Saying it loud sounds like an accusation, and heaven knows Keith doesn't blame his brother for slipping away when he had the chance. Something feels wrong, though, something in the way Shiro holds himself tonight. The confident set of his shoulders is missing, his posture exhausted and slumped; it sets off something like concern (or maybe, fear) in his chest, and so Keith asks him, "Why weren't you here today, Shiro?"

"Keith," Shiro says, "I'm tired of this."

Keith blinks, surprised. This isn't news to him. They've traded their frustration at the way things work more often than not in the dead of the night, sitting curled up on the porch steps with Shiro nursing a glass of wine in his hand. But this, this feels different. It feels wrong. "Well, so do I."

Shiro shakes his head. "No, it's not whatever you're thinking of."

"Well, then tell me what you're thinking of," Keith presses. He isn't worried, but there is something akin to apprehension tingling into existence along and under his skin. It's an unpleasant sensation, like a persistent itch, just out of reach. "Shiro?"

His brother looks— distraught. It's a strange, unfamiliar expression on him. Keith is used to seeing him tall and broad and imposing, not this shrivelled husk of a man. "I don't— I don't think there's a place for me, here."

"Here, in this town?" Keith asks, confused. He goes along with the most superficial thought that pops into his dazed head, because something darker is looming in the shadows and he doesn't want to cast his gaze to the corner. "There's always the city, and you can—"

"Keith, no, I—" Shiro appears to be frustrated. He's tugging at his sleeve, over and over, a nervous tic. "I meant, here. This, this town, these _people_ , and—" his voice softens. "— and this house."

"Shiro." Keith says. "Shiro, look at me."

"You know they're never going to care," the words spill out of his brother's mouth like water from a pitcher, fast and sharp and decisive. "Never, not in a million years."

"You can't leave," Keith whispers.

"Even if I—" one of his hands flies up to his hair, and his fingers curl in his hair, dangerously close to ripping it out from the roots. "Even if I stuff them to their throats with money, I will always be unwelcome to them. I'll always be a, a fuckin' _abomination_ , a cripple, that's what."

"What are you saying?" Keith demands, a nervous flutter exploding behind his lungs. " _What_ , what are you implying?"

"Come with me," Shiro begs, turning to face him. The moonlight is silvery broad swathes, luminous and bright, and his brother's face stands sliced open in the glow. He looks younger, more vulnerable than Keith has seen him in years. "Keith, come with me. We can— we can run away, no one would find out. Adam's already found a place in the city, no one will—"

"Adam?" Keith repeats, sounding out the name on his tongue. It sits heavy, almost unfamiliar, but Shiro's face screws up into a frown, and it strikes him. "Oh _god_ , oh god no, you—"

"It was the only way," Shiro insists, face hardened into stone. "They would've killed him."

"So, now, you're running away too."

"I'm not running away." Shiro replies testily. "I'm leaving so i can make a decision on my own, for _once_ in my goddamned life."

"You—" Keith’s throat is clawed shut. "You can't just _leave_ , Shiro. You can't."

Shiro steps forward. The piece of paper folds easily when he pushes it into Keith’s trembling fingers. "When it gets too much," his brother says, in that calm voice that he's always used to lull him into silence, "when it gets too much, come find me."

"Shiro," Keith calls, and his voice is trembling. "Shiro, don't leave me. _Please_ , I can't, you can't leave me here, you _can't_ , Shiro—"

In the end, it doesn't even matter. Shiro's arms are searing hot and tight around him when he pulls him to his chest— an ancient gesture, an unspoken promise, a wordless _you'll always have me_. Keith cries a little, the tears sliding hot and crisp down his baked skin, but it doesn't even matter. He's left standing at the doorway, watching his brother walk away from the cracked, peeling house they grew up in. Keith presses a hand over his mouth when Shiro throws one last glance over his shoulder, a quiet farewell. And then he's gone.

His mother wakes him in the morning with frantic sobbing, Shiro's letter crumpled between her fingers, and Keith pretends like he's been roused mere moments ago. No one questions the red around his eyes. It's the wine, he says to himself, and heads into the living room to stand by their (his, _Shiro's_ ) mother in stoic silence.

.

The collar of Keith’s shirt burns like a brand against his neck. He struggles with it discreetly, snaking a hand up to his throat to work the top button loose. His mother glances over sharply the minute it springs loose, her little pink mouth wording along to the hymn echoing through the air of the little church. _Angels, we have heard on high, sweetly singing o'er the plain_ — Keith lets his hand drop, wincing as the back of his hand twinges with a punishment long forgotten. He spends the rest of the hour tracing the swirling waves of scarlet and gold and emerald green glass that wash over the rough stone floor, his prayer book grasped loosely between lax fingers.

The sermon today was one he has heard within the same wooden pews a million times before, a single drop in the sea of topics that their pastor reuses every time he runs out of new things to discuss. _Genesis_ , he had crooned in his nasally voice, hands latched onto the edge of the teak like someone would come and pry him away from the beloved pulpit, _genesis, creation, beginnings_. Men and women with clasped hands and hazy eyes had watched and listened and taken it all in, lapping it up with eager sandpaper tongues and wide unhinged jaws, while their children kicked their feet and whined about going back home. He had spied the old seamstress that lived at the very edge of town when he was making his way out the doors. Her head was bowed, eyes shut in prayer.

"Keith, sweetheart," his mother calls the minute he steps outside the church. People mill about, greeting each other, exchanging pleasantries, empty little _oh but I do hope you can make it for dinner soon_ , and _yes yes how's your daughter I heard she was meeting that strange boy from the other town last week_. He turns, and she comes up to stand by his elbow. "Be a darling and carry this home for me, will you?"

"Of course, mother," Keith nods, accepting the proferred satchel with a courteous bow towards the baker's wife. His mother puffs with ill concealed approval as she glances between the two of them, gauging the other woman's reaction. "How long until you get back home?"

"I'll be back in an hour or so," his mother smiles, her mouth stretched wide and welcoming. She pushes lightly at his arm, nudging him towards the stairs. "Go on, then."

Keith bows, again. "Goodbye, mother," he rises from his stance to bend a little lower in front of the other woman, and hears his mother's pleased little exhale to his left. "Have a good day, ma'am."

The baker's wife raises a gloved hand in farewell, and his mother looks over her shoulder at him one last time. She nods curtly once, he's passed the evaluation. She turns in place, immaculate smile plastered right back in place, and leads her acquaintance around the church.

The grass crunches pleasantly under his shoes as he crosses the front of the lawns, absently toying with the clasp of the satchel in his hands. The air hangs fresh and sharp, and the breeze is cold enough for Keith to shiver imperceptibly in his cotton spun shirt. The trees, gnarled and ashen, line the road back home. Most people have already returned to the comfort of their hearths, and the silence dangles in the void with all the promise of glass beads prepared to shatter.

Keith is almost at the fence that separates their house from the squat stone building next to it. There had been plans to establish something there, some trade to rival the big businesses that had fallen flat when the city folk put their minds to crushing it. Keith’s a town dweller, just one of the simple folk who performs simple chores. It's unlike him to make sense of complicated tangles of money and power. Some things, you're supposed to leave to other people.

A sound rises from the interior of the building, a high pitched cry, loud and unabashed. Keith halts, eyes swerving to the slight gap left behind in the front door. The street is empty, wiped clean of any stragglers, and he's considering the possibility of rushing back home and grabbing a steak knife when the sound reaches him again. Something twists in his stomach, dark and curious, and he walks briskly across the high grass and into the building.

A man stands in the first room he comes across, the one that branches off from the central corridor and has two sets of footprints leading into it emblazoned into the dust. He's leaning forward, forearms braced on the wall, and the afternoon sun sieving in through the jagged windows _burns_ his hair to the strangest shade of coppery red. The gasp sounds again, and Keith realises with a start— dragging his eyes away from the man's startling bare torso, that there's someone beneath him.

The man shifts his neck to the side, tilting his head so he can murmur something darkly to the woman writhing under his weight. She's pale and pretty, with decidedly delicate features, although the sinful noises ripping past her lips seem anything but demure. She slams her head back against the wall, over and over, enraged and incensed, just a breath shy of tipping over the edge. "You _fucking_ — stop fuckin' _teasing_ , you swine—" and the man laughs, chuckling delightfully, revelling in her fury. He pulls back long enough to grasp the side of her neck with skilled fingers; Keith catches a flash of white before he closes his teeth around her throat, and she _screams_.

" _Oh_ , oh _god_ , oh—" Nyma cries, the noise slamming into Keith’s chest with all the blunt force of the blacksmith's hammer. Her eyes fly open, hazy and unseeing, the pupils rolled up and leaving behind a blank expanse of white, before she gasps keenly. Her neck drops down, her eyes lift and all of a sudden, just like that, she's looking at him.

She stiffens immediately tensing up at the presence of a stranger, a voyeur— before she exhales heavily. "Oh, _Keith_ , it's just you," Nyma huffs out an amused laugh, peering curiously at him. She tilts her head to the side, and the blossoming red against her throat feels like a noose around his own neck. "The sermon ended early today?"

"Nyma, I'm so _terribly_ sorry, I didn't mean to intrude—" Keith blurts out, stumbling backwards. The edge of the door slams into his spine, the doorjamb digging into the small of his back. He sucks in a sharp breath, chest aching, bowing quickly. "— I, I have to go, I'm sorry."

Keith thuds out of the room and down the hallway, the satchel slamming loosely against the top of his leg. His pulse beats a loud, furious, agitated staccato in his ears with every hurried clack of his shoes against the gravel, and he collapses against the door the minute he manages to scramble inside. For all of the next hour and a half that it takes for his mother to return, Keith stays pressed against the floor, willing away all reminders of blue eyes and bronzed skin and veins dragging along flesh like the ridges of the mountains in the north. The sounds, they keep coming back to him over dinner, like the incomplete strains of a lullaby.

Keith lies back in his bed at the end of the day, watching the breeze turn cold and colder still while the town sleeps. It rings quietly in his head, over and over, like a broken record ( _genesis, creation, beginnings_ ).

.

The people in the village, they're simple folk. They tend their farms and they tend their flowers and they tend their cattle. They're quiet men and women, young and old, born and buried in the same dirt that clings to all of their cotton clothes. They speak softly, they mind their own business, they go to church and kneel at the altar and wait for their prayers to be answered. They do not speak ill of the dead, they forget the ones that went missing, they erase the ones that ran away.

Keith is walking back home one afternoon from the tanning factory. His hands hurt, and the acrid smell of acid seems to have stitched itself into the plain red of his shirt. The crisp tang of winter melts on his tongue and he shivers, curling his shoulders inwards. That's when he hears it.

Like the rumbling tremor of a gong piercing the silence, the sound of his name jars him to the bone. He spins on his heel, seeing an unfamiliar man leaning against the lamppost. He smiles. "You're Shirogane's younger brother," the man says.

Keith stiffens. "I'm Julia's son," he answers evenly. "May I help you with something?"

"So, you know," the man chuckles again, taking a few steps forward. The edge of his wool coat flaps in the wind. "I'm not from this town."

Keith nods, curt and brief. "It doesn't take a scholar to know you don't belong here," he snarks. The man laughs quietly, shaking his head. His hair is still glowing copper, although the sun is close to down. "How did you know my brother?"

"No, I _know_ your brother," the man corrects him, and Keith feels a distant sigh of relief, a breath he had been holding for what seemed to be aeons (how long had it been? Two years, three? All he knows is, he kept waiting for a closed coffin to rest at their doorstep). "Takashi is a good man, a good partner."

"Why are you here," Keith asks flatly. His arms cross over his chest, and he breathes.

"You saw me that day," the man says. "With the baker's daughter."

Keith nods. "Yes, and I apologise for it."

He shakes his head. "Why," he starts, voice laced through with amusement, "didn't you tell anyone?"

Keith raises his head. "Because Nyma is a good woman, she shouldn't have to be berated for having her innocence corrupted by a man," he shrugs, lifting a shoulder, "especially not one of the likes of you."

"And what about you?" the stranger asks with a smile. "Are you a good man?"

Keith nods. He feels like he's being burned alive at the stake, in a fire, under the gaze of this unfamiliar man from an unfamiliar town. "Yes, I should certainly hope so."

(" _Hope_ ," Leandro groans later, his teeth dragging by the skin at Keith’s ear and ripping a sound so visceral and primal from his lips that the entire tool shed trembles at the din. "You hope for your salvation, yet you beg me to sin."

"What sins would you be willing to commit at— at my request?" Keith gasps, feeling the scrape of wood shavings across and over his back. He lets his head thud against the bench, spent and shaking in his boots. "Would you condemn yourself?"

Leandro pulls away, mouth stained red and skin molten gold. "You're the little church boy, aren't you?" He lifts a hand to cradle his cheek, and smiles crookedly. "Then seek, and ye shall find.")

.

Keith returns home past midnight. His mother sleeps quiet in her room and Keith stays awake, counting the spidery cracks in the window and wondering if the Alvarez boy has a home of his own.

.

The sun warms the grass under his skin when Keith sits down heavily, feeling the familiar dull crunch under his weight. The hills roll on in an endless billow of green, like the folds of Demeter's robes splayed across ivory floors. The mountains to the north lie shrouded in thick billows of fog, and the sounds of men heaving and grunting pierces through the silence to reach his ears.

"What's happening out there?" Keith asks, eyes trained upon the scores of men labouring away. Leandro looks ahead, gemstone blue eyes glittering like a robin egg. The corner of his mouth twitches when he answers.

"They're executing her last will and testament, what else," he drawls in an affected tone, shifting his weight onto his palms as he leans back. He's wearing nothing but a thin grey shirt tucked carelessly into threadbare pants. "The house, they're making it an orphanage."

Keith nods, solemn. "I never talked to her," he starts, reaching out a hand to trace the beginnings of a tear in the fabric above his knee. "But mother, she always had such a high opinion of Allura." he pauses, lifting his face up to the sky. "Called her the most wonderful lady she ever did see."

Leandro looks to him. His face is twisted with wry amusement, mouth set in a calculating grin. "Neither of you knew her."

One of the men shouts in warning, and there's a loud crash in the distance. "Did you?" Keith asks.

Leandro nods. "The same way I know Shiro, yes."

Keith blinks. "What, she— she's alive?"

The young man laughs, loud and bright, tipping his head back as his chest rumbles with the sound. "Yes, sweetheart," he chuckles, resting his cheek upon his shoulder as he appraises Keith with a narrowed gaze, "who else do you think helped her out in the middle of the night?"

Something hot, _furious_ is starting to contort in Keith’s stomach. "And what about my brother?" Leandro falls silent, all traces of laughter wiped clean from his face. Keith ploughs on, hands shaking from their loose tangle in his lap. "Did you— did you help him, too?"

Leandro stays quiet long enough for Keith to lurch backwards. His head spins, and the men continue to holler at the mansion in the distance. "Keith, will you hear me out?"

"No," he speaks, his voice so small it could be lost in the wind. "No, I should go back."

"He didn't leave you behind," Leandro presses on, and Keith inhales a rattling gasp. His chest _aches_ , aches with pain from a wound that's not seen to the eye, that's not felt by the skin. "Keith, he didn't _leave_ you, you have to understand that—"

"He didn't leave me?" Keith repeats, incredulous. He's on his feet, swaying a little unsteadily. Leandro reaches out a hand in a startlingly familiar gesture, almost as if to hold him, but Keith slaps it away. "He didn't _leave_ me? What else do you— what else do you call this, then?"

"You're his brother," he insists, voice firm and controlled, rational, as if he's grinning sharply and saying _so, why don't you show me around town_? He's standing tall and confident, such a contrast to Keith’s hunched figure and trembling arms. "He didn't leave you behind, he moved ahead with his own life."

"He left me here to _rot_ ," Keith snarls, mouth curling around the words, and his chest stretches tight and sharp and scathing over his ribs, "in this, this _town_ and with these people and in that, that house— when he _knows_ , he knows what I _feel_ , he knows how scared I was—"

"You can always do what he did, Keith," Leandro says with a shrug of his shoulders, muscles tensed beneath his shirt like the taut string of a bow poised to let a poisoned arrow fly. He takes a step forward, and the breeze ruffles through his copper hair. "Nothing's tying you down." he looks up at him through thick framed lashes, hiding an ocean behind a fringed curtain. "I know they're not your blood."

"Perhaps not my blood, but the dust in our veins is the same," Keith spits, "I don't view loyalty the way my brother does, I will not run away."

Leandro’s face hardens. "Then you're willing to stay here, stay here 'til you're _dead_ , watching everything you could've ever had walk away from you?" he shakes his head in disbelief, fury etched across his face in gentle strokes. "I don't understand."

"Stay here, I must," Keith says, with a small smile, heart thrumming and blood singing a song of mourners, "but were we ever alive?"

.

Keith runs his finger down the curve of Leandro’s leg, his touch gossamer light and soaked in reverence. It's fascinating, the way the flesh quivers in anticipation like a beast provoked before it settles back down, warm and smooth and silken soft under his fingertips. Above him, Leandro hums a far off tune under his breath, the words tumbling between the sweet lilt of Spanish and the crisp bluntness of English. The clatter of hooves echoes in the stillness. The sun isn't up yet, it must be the new shipment from the city.

"Have you never written to your brother again?" Leandro asks. His voice is hushed, soft, mixing right in with the soft pinks brushed across the sky. Keith stills against him for a long drawn moment, and then sighs.

"Adam wrote to me a few months later," he replies, the words sitting bitter and barbed upon his tongue. He recalls the thick paper, the creamy white beneath the bold black strokes of ink, the envelope that had crumpled like twigs in his fist. "He said he never wished to wound me so, and that— that I was welcome, to visit them anytime I wanted."

"Yeah?" Leandro asks, gently. His hand drops into Keith’s hair, a rich bronze against soot black. He digs his fingers into his scalp a little, pushing his hair off his face. "And what did you think of it, sweetheart?"

"He had nothing to apologise for," Keith says. The stables smell sweet, hay and mist and fresh blooming flowers from the sprawling lawns outside. It's comforting, and he pushes up and into Leandro’s chest, feeling his arm wrap around his waist. "Some things, you cannot control."

Leandro holds him closer, chest rising with the heavy breath he sucks in. Keith stays silent, placing his palm flat over his heart, feeling it race and rabbit under his touch.

"Shiro wrote to me," Leandro says quietly after a while, his voice shattering the heady silence. "I'm— I'm needed elsewhere."

"But, you—" Keith fumbles for a minute, his tongue sinking listlessly in his mouth. The words dance just out of reach, even though he can feel them dangling right there, right _here_ , like the fruits of Tantalus, so close yet so out of reach. He pushes off his chest, sitting up in a dazed stupor. "—you said, you _told_ me, you told me you were here to stay."

"Only as long as I wasn't called for," Leandro answers, rising gracefully. He pinches the bridge of his nose, exasperated, tired, _exhausted_. "I cannot just turn my back on this, you know that."

"How long?" Keith demands, mouth dry. "How long will you be gone?"

"I don't know," he answers, voice strained. "It could be a while."

" _How long_ , Leandro?" Keith grits out. His chest aches, like a vice clamped around his stomach. It clenches, tighter and tighter, cutting off his breaths.

"Three years," Leandro says.

Keith rises on stumbling feet. He feels sick, stomach churning and chest heaving. " _Three_ ," he manages to choke out, "three years, you'll be gone."

"I don't want to go," Leandro pleads, the blanket pooled around his waist. He reaches out a hand towards him, towards Keith. "Sweetheart, if I could, I would have refused this, I _swear_."

"Three years," Keith repeats, blankly. "Three years, and you want me to wait here? Wait for you to come back to me, just so you can leave again?"

"Come with me," Leandro begs, sliding forward towards Keith’s prone form. He's at his feet, humbled and broken, _kneeling_ before Keith like in the pews of a church, whispering prayers into the silence and hoping it reaches the heavens instead of being lost in the resounding cacophony of noises. "Come with me, Keith, _please_ , you don't have to stay."

"I can't just—" Keith starts, and his throat contracts so sharply it _hurts_. He shakes his head. "I want to, _god_ , I wish I could, but I—I can't just come with you.”

"Consider it, you _have_ to consider it," Leandro babbles, face pressed into the supple flesh of Keith’s calves. "Keith, _swear_ to me, you will consider it."

Keith’s mother screams the minute he steps foot inside the house. Her face is red, splotched and furious, and she forces him to tug off his shirt when her eyes narrow in on the marks etched into the column of his throat. The flat of her hand across his cheeks still stings as sharp as it did when he was fourteen, young and terrified and cowering behind Shiro, and belatedly, he wonders if his brother did the right thing, running away. His head is still spinning, words melting and tangling and fusing and dancing together.

_Come with me, we can run away, no one would find out. Come with me, you don't have to stay_.

_It's all because of that Alvarez boy_ , she bellows with a walking cane grasped between her fingers, _you turned out so rotten, one a cripple and the other a disgusting swine, the lord is punishing me for my sins_ , and as the polished wood descends upon the arch of his spine, Keith thinks of a small piece of paper stashed away in his drawer, and smiles.

.

The street is empty, wiped clean of all signs of life. The breeze is fresh, crisp and tasting faintly of sugar and cinnamon. The last of the blacksmith's coals lay scattered haphazardly across the cobbled walkway, and the dirt track still bears deep clawed gouges from the city's carts rumbling in laden with heavy shipments. The shutters are drawn, doors and windows bolted shut, silence draped like a heavy shroud over the street that once bustled with cheer in the early hours of the morning.

Keith sits with his back to a post, ankles crossed in front of him. The metal is cool against his back, almost soothing against the burned flesh chafing across his shirt. He tugs his braid over one shoulder, patting down its rough ends. The moon is waning, a thin slice of silver suspended in the skies. He looks up at it, counting down the minutes.

Before long, he hears the familiar muffled stride of worn leather boots rumbling against the cobblestones. The scent of spice and clean sweat wafts up when the man stops next to him. "Bit too late to be out, isn't it, sweetheart?"

"I suppose so," Keith shrugs, getting to his feet. "You are past the hour, I've been waiting here for a while."

Leandro’s mouth curls fondly. "Apologies, but we should be on our way, then," he chuckles, adjusting the lapel of his coat. He eyes the bag hanging off Keith’s shoulder with a quirked eyebrow. "Do you even know where you're going?"

"No," Keith answers, brushing the dust off his hands, he cocks his head, "but I have you, don't i?"

The wind is picking up when Leandro reaches out to take his hand. "We should leave," he says, fingers tightening around his. He says it like a question, phrasing it with just the slightest hints of uncertainty and indecision. It's a silent opening, a backdoor. _Do you want to do this_ , he's asking instead.

Keith smiles, feeling the burn of the split down his lip when he does. "We should leave," he repeats, and leads them down the street while the town sleeps.


End file.
